Perfect

[Splitpin]

Whatever we design , or have designed ...NOTHING is better than this .
Power to weight is perfect , handling is perfect and so on , and this applies to all of our feathered freinds. ... but these are special (to me at least)

Perfect .

[Ian Warren]

Is it going to be at the airshow tomorrow

[Splitpin]

Where I work , i get an airshow everyday .
If its not the NZ equivalent of the picture , its the little swallows , or the magpies.
Last week I watched two hawks fighting ... a real dog fight.... or bird fight , whatever.
I think my favorite is the Plover , the A-10 of the bird world , they will take on anything to protect their turf .

[Ian Warren]

This is one thing I still recall when I was at Riccarton High School , from the top of the two story E & F block was these Magie's and Seagulls in a dogfight, it was quite amazing to watch, I was really pissed when the teacher required me to come inside, Mr Christenson , we called him weasel boots, tho now have to admit did have the imagination because I brought it up in class .... was told I was using my eyeballs or least watch what is going on around me , that was introduction to the first year 3 form High School , Seagulls the heavy fighters and the Magpie , the single seater.

[Splitpin]

Your onto to it Ian

[Ian Warren]

Yeah , Marty your like me and many others here ... Cloud gazing , bird watching and really watching !

[emfrat]

I have sat for many hours at various places along the NSW South Coast, just watching the pelicans. You could see the young being brought up through Basic to Advanced and then to OCTU. Magic fliers - they fly a perfect circuit approach, and touch down with everything hanging out.
Another time, darling daughter and I were camping in the Snowy, and one day we walked up Kosciusko by the old road. There was a deep valley on our right, and a raptor hovering at our three o'clock high, almost certainly a peregrine falcon. Next thing, it folded up and went into stoop mode, from about 300m above us, to about 500m below. It got something but it was too far down for us humans to see. You only get to see something like that once or maybe twice in a lifetime

[Ian Warren]

Another classic example of "When birds attack" this even happens on the early morning in the shopping mall car-park across the road here were seagulls dive bomb you, the best attack like that I had was when I was out on the Sumner Spit and seagulls in cab rank come diving in attacking , that get exciting.

[deeknow]

Haha you got it Marty, the Plover really is an A10, just as angry and just as noisy, if a little ugly and rough around the edges.

I live across the road from someone who (I think) owns racing pigeons, they could be wild and just happen to roost somewhere in his back yard, either way I'm ALWAYS impressed by their flying antics, so manoeuvrable, and compact, like fighter planes, and the formation flying is a sight to behold.

[Charl]

Yeah, around here the plovers gang up on the hawks and drive them away!
Thread title sums it up, Marty - what a perfect picture, thanks for the post.

[Fozzer]

I occasionally enjoy the sight of a pair of black-and-white Magpies, with their fat bellies, in my back garden.

If I see one, I can bet that their mate is not far away!

I used to put out food for the birds at one time, until I found out, (via the Local Council) that it also encourages Rats and other vermin in the area!

Care has to be taken now, how and where to place Bird food!

Fortunately, my food only attracts me....

...and Sharon... ...!

Paul.... ...!

[Ian Warren]

and the formation flying is a sight to behold.

That is the way I look at ducks in low level formation flight , they look so streamline.

Another bird that was amazing to watch was Swans on Lake Kanerie, Grant in his Jetboat late evening and the water was like glass , these four Swans in echelon were up to the same speed off to the left trying to take of , Grant slowed the jetboat down to around 30 MPH and stay in formation as they finally got airborne , that was something to really see , some reason I thought of these big flying boats, wing were slowly flapping and they were walking on the water... amazing view !